Latino Media Gulf Coast president Grace McCaffery says ST Engineering has laid off about 45 employees from Chili.
“They have kind of organized together because they cannot get answers from the company,” McCaffery said. “They tell me that the HR director has deferred them to an attorney and neither one of them returns their phone calls and trying to get answers about the situation. They were told they were being laid off for an indefinite amount of time, but they were going to get paid for two weeks. After about the third week, they started getting phone calls that they were being let go.”
She said the workers expected long-term employment and sold their homes and jobs. “Most of them actually had a military career in their country, and they took the retirement. They went into retirement to accept this job, expecting it to be long-term because that was inferred to them when they were being recruited. And now just after a year, they’re being told they’ve got to go back.”
According to McCaffery, the workers have 60 days from their last day of work from their sponsored employer to find a new employer or leave the country.
She said, “I know there’s some talk about that this is something that companies. They bring employees from another country or another place as they’re getting things set up. The problem with that is that they didn’t tell these workers that it was going to be a year. They didn’t tell ’em it was going to be short term. And had they done that, I would assume they would have a very difficult time recruiting them in the first place. But these workers would’ve not invested so much into coming here and accepting this position.”
Pensacola Mayor D.C. Reeves is expected to address this issue tomorrow at his weekly press conference. He will on “Real News” tomorrow at 7:45 a.m.
What to help these families?
From Grace McCaffery:
Four families reached out after we spoke. I have already helped two families. While I plan to push for ST to provide severance pay for these workers, some are running out of resources. Any help is welcome. Donors can contact me for account information (850-494-7899, grace@latinomediainc.com). We are navigating some cultural barriers to help them with their uneasiness in accepting aid.
People can also mail a check to the Hispanic Resource Center of Northwest Florida, P.O. Box 284, Pensacola, FL 32591.
